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Presentation: The Dangers of Void Adaptation
Presentation: The Dangers of Void Adaptation By M.DS. Nicole Taylor, at Riga Symposium 2021 Audio transcript Void Adaptation is a rarely discussed topic of a relatively unknown field. Nevertheless, it is the opinion of the ETD that this is one of the potentially most dangerous effects in our modern day. My name is Nicole Taylor, Master of Dimensional Science, and today I will introduce you to the basics of this phenomena, and why the ETD came to this conclusion. First, what is Void Adeptation? As the details are rooted in Dimensional Science, a field some of you are unfamiliar with, I will briefly go over the basics relevant to our discussion. As we all know, space is deadly. The cold vacuum of deep space will kill any man not properly equipped. And that’s after we’re done formatting it… For before we do, space is filled with a vast array of alien entities and influences, all opposed to our goals. Luckily, throughout the years we have, through Enlightened Science, developed the means to keep us safe in space, to hold both the void of our making and the terrible energies outside of it. While the procedures we developed can keep a man alive and even relatively safe for a long time, they cannot sustain a human indefinitely… But that’s where Horizon Constructs, our installations and colonies, come in. Permanent installations with advanced, long term measures against the void, mankind can live along the stars inside them for as long as they stand. We also briefly have to touch the topic of Extra-Dimensional Entities – EDE’s for short. We’ve all likely heard the stories, of supposed apparitions of dead people, strange unexplained phenomena. In fact, humanity – and superstitionists – often talk of “Ghosts” or “Spirits”. However, although certainly a complex topic, Enlightened Science has made great strides in explaining and dealing with these phenomena. Sustained by complex energies from alien dimensions, they operate much like any biological being. EDE’s are a catch-all term; while they share many characteristics, their origins are as varied as their capabilities. Some include… Dimensional echo’s of formerly living beings. These are the sources of most “ghost” stories – ‘after-images’ if you will that act much like the originals. Alien life, either mostly biological or seemingly lacking any biological component at all. Creatures created by deviant perversions of Enlightened Science And many other means besides One being the topic of discussion here. Void Adeptation. As before, space is hostile to human life. Not just in the obvious ways, however. Rapid exposure – seconds to hours – results in rapid death. The details depend on the circumstances, but are never pleasant. However, even slow exposure – properly protected individuals, even so much as in a ship, will eventually result in death, as no portable protection can keep all of the effects of the void out. A notable exception however, are Enlightened individuals. Space is deadly to us as well, of course, but there is an alternate, even less pleasant possible outcome. Enlightened individuals can keep themselves alive in space, but they can’t keep out the void, not forever. And so it builds up inside of them. Eventually, the alien influences will start to change them, corruption their biological processes and, in the process, perverting their thoughts. The end result, for all intents and purposes, is an Extra-dimensional Entity, now composed of the same types of matter and energy as any other. As far as we know, the original is lost to us forever. Luckily, this process is slow. It takes about 3 to 6 months for this process to progress to a terminal stage… And with proper containment procedures and equipment, it can be extended much longer. Lastly, until the final stages, it is fully reversible, as the body will heal itself in a regular environment. So, what does Void Adaptation do? As the original is transformed, it retains it’s memories, and even much of it’s personality However, these are changed along with it’s biology, twisted to an inhuman caricature of it’s former self. The result is a fully alien entity, who’s former ties to humanity only emphasize the horror of what it has become And to make matters worse, the entity retains the knowledge and procedures it had as well – twisted as everything else, but no less powerful. While that explains the basic dangers of Void Adeptation, why is it considered so dangerous now? For that, we have to contrast it to history. Void Adeptation has always existed in history. Consider, for example, Magellan – known to us all as a famous Explorator. In his days, the earth itself was not fully formatted to comform to the consensus, yet – indeed, that was Magellan’s purpose. Their journey was as long as any, however, and at the Battle of Mactan, one of his luitenants discovered his transformation. His actions became brutal, and his mind increasingly unstable. His luitenant, Afonso de Góis, had to strike him down – and was struck down himself soon after, his fellows not understanding what had happened. Another, more recent example, is Sarah Anne Jones. Her ship missed her orbital rendezvous due to an engine failure. She managed to keep life support going for 9 months until the next window, but by the time we found her again, she set upon the crew of the ship that came for her. She, too, was lost. It has, however, always been a rare phenomena. Again – it does bear repeating – space is deadly, and in an unprotected environment, most die before Void Adaptation can set in. Moreover, it takes long enough – and is noticeable enough – that it can safely be avoided during routine operation. While the phenomena has always been one of interest to us, we have had little opportunity to study it in detail. It’s rarity and danger prevented detailed study of afflicted individual, and recreating the effect would be both unethical and – for the less scrupulous – too costly. So what changed? Threat Null Some of you have already heard the term, or it’s official designation, “Emerging Threats Capable of Nullifying Enlightened Procedures”, in reports and requisition requests. A new network of powerful EDE’s that are adept at working against Enlightened Science. They were first encountered roughly a year after the Dimensional Anomaly – after we regained the ability to project power in deep space. It’s a closely aligned set of groups – all different from each other, and seemingly utterly incompatible. But they work together anyway, against us. And for a good reason. Threat Null is, of course, our designation for them. But they don’t call themselves Threat Null… They call themselves the Technocratic Union. The Dimensional Anomaly is key to what happened. We’ve all lost colleagues, friends that fateful day. And it’s after effects are ravaging as we speak. But the damage went much further still. It caused violent, chaotic fluctuations throughout Deep Space These devastated or outright destroyed all Technocratic installations. A handful were able to recover regular operations, the vast majority didn’t. The majority of Technocratic personnel, then, were believed to have died This includes most of the higher ups of the Technocracy – the Board, the Inner Circle, Administration, DSEATC, the Computer, even Control. All based on Horizon Constructs. Like I said, it took months before we regained the ability to project in space and search for survivors. And what we found, we could not recognize. Threat Null, as we know it today, is composed of 4 distinct groups. All operate independent, though in concert, and all members of a group are strikingly similar. Autopolitans are a group of cyborgs. They vary widely in their individual form, although all are more machine than man. What they all share is a hive mind – networked through their implants, having no discernable minds of their own. Present in all is evidence of temporal acceleration – artificially sped up mechanical evolution. Residents are the least openly hostile, yet the most insidious of the groups. They appear as advisors, negotiators and traders – to anyone and anything, and dealing ín anything – and anyone. Before we realized what they were, they would deal with us openly as well – probably still would – but their deals always end up hurting in the end. They’ve spread across space and dimensions, these days often found openly advising EDE’s – and informing on us to the rest of Threat Null. “Transhumanity” styles themselves perfect. In fact, the picture you see isn’t just one individual - *all* members of Transhumanity look exactly like this. And they offer to turn anyone else they find into an equally “perfect human”. This equality isn’t limited to the body – while the details aren’t fully understood, they are linked into a hive mind much like the Autopolitans, except based on biological systems rather than networked computers. “Agents” – so named because they occasionally refer working for an “Agency”, operate as undercover operatives. The example here is one posing as a regular member of the New World Order – and was quite effective. Their operations are utterly inscrutable – even, according to field observations, to the rest of Threat Null. Nonetheless, after-the-fact analysis of their operations always shows the effectiveness of their interventions. They are also master infiltrators, having taken more than one voidship down that way. Threat Null, then, are a new form of Void Adapted individuals. What makes them different than those encountered before? First, of course, is their numbers. While it’s unknown exactly what portion of former Technocrats succumbed to Void Adaptation, it is still a larger number than all other victims in recorded history – at once. The second is in the name – “Capable of Nullifying Enlightened Procedures”. The name is a bit of an exaggeration – a holdover from the early days. However, Threat Null has proven quite adept at countering Enlightened procedures, much more effectively than earlier threats. After all, They already know all of our former procedures, tactics and capabilities. Implementing new ones has proven to be an effective strategy, but not all can be replaced so easily. The enemy is organized. Both within their own groups, and between the groups as a whole. In fact, while their goals are incompatible, they seem forced to work together. Which has a good reason… Conditioning. They still have it after their transformation. As with almost everything about Threat Null, it’s changed – but if anything, it binds them together stronger than it ever did before. Alone, that would be a worrying enough. But here is the worst part – Assimilation. Threat Null is capable of tapping into the conditioning present in current Technocratic personnel, and using it against us, rapidly and forcibly co-opting it to bring the victim to their side. At first, the process was slow, but as of late, even brief indirect contact can be enough for a Threat Null operative to use this ability. Countermeasures exist, but are often only limited in effectiveness. In fact, this ability is not limited to Enlightened personnel – many a Citizen has fallen to Threat Null this way. In the front line of this new war we find ourselves in is Fleet Operations Command, along with the marines it acts in concert with. Their status, then, gives a grim insight in the state of the war. Listed here is the fleet strength before and immediately during the initial Dimensional Anomaly. Fleet lost most of it’s power in one fell swoop there. The initial start of hostilities with Threat Null caused heavy casualties as well; And while adaptive tactics proved effective in minimizing losses, the current trend is clear: production cannot keep up with rates of attrition. Current production facilities have been streamlined to deal with limited resources – I refer you to handout F-21 – but that cannot fully compensate. While the chart does not list reserve power, activating that – while it becomes increasingly necessary – severely harms long-term fleet effectiveness. Another important front line is Earth itself. In that, the Dimension Anomaly proved to have a hidden blessing within it’s curse – it’s ongoing effects seem to hinder Threat Null almost as much as it does us. In fact, the Dimensional Barrier surrounding the earth seems extraordinarily effective against Threat Null, making it almost impossible for them to find their way back to earth. That doesn’t mean they don’t try, however. So far, isolation protocols have proven effective. IDC actively monitors for any attempts that slip by PDC and BCD, and rapid response has eliminated all incursions. However, pressure has been mounting over the years. In fact, this week, the first uncontained breach was detected right here in Riga. The threat could be neutralized before major damage could be given. I hope by now that the gravity of the threat we face is clear. Recent events, however, have given us both new opportunities and new fears. Let’s discuss what by now has likely occurred to you all. All the currently found groups map roughly to a technocratic convention. In essence, members of Threat Null take up a dark caricature of their former convention. So far, however, no former Void Engineers have been detected among Threat Null – either as an organized faction, or even individual former members. However, Void Engineer bases have been devastated and lost at roughly the same rate as Constructs of other conventions – and there were a lot more of them. So we expect them to exists. We have not found them, however… At least, not in this universe. Enter EV-YD145. An Everett Volume, not formerly explored by any technocratic expeditions. The Volume came to our, rather immediate, attention when a dimensional breach linked the two dimensions, following a freak Voidcast drive failure, simultaneously in both our universe as their volume. The Everett Volume was one where Threat Null had already overcame Earth defenses, in concert with their own Void Engineer equivalents. During the events of the breach, the operation in the Everett Volume found over 500 survivors, and retrieved them for debriefing. The intelligence thus gathered pointed to some important differences between the Volume and the primary universe. Nonetheless, Enough insight has been gathered to feed into statistical models to give useful results. So, Threat Null Void Engineers – or VE-T0’s. What can we expect? The Void Engineers were likely best equipped to survive the effects of the Anomaly – although it was likely in the same order of magnitude. In our universe, the Void Engineers took on a different aspect, and opted to retreat further back into the void. However, their retreat is likely temporary. Once they do get back to our region of space, We can only assume that their conditioning held, and they will thus link up with the rest of Threat Null. Furthermore, considering that each of the groups has it’s strength in roughly the same areas as before, it is likely that VE-T0 is most adept at breaking down the Dimensional Barrier. And statistical models expects their arrival in 1 to 5 years. So, what does this all mean for our future? 1 If we are to stand any chance to fight the incoming threat, we will require vastly more resources and manpower to prepare for the threat. 2 The conditioning of Technocratic personnel will have to be addressed. I hope that, in light of this reveal, the recommendations of my colleague in her earlier presentation are given additional weight. 3 But most of all; our great Union was founded to focus our united scientific and political resources against deviant threats. Now, more than ever before, the union must truly unite against this new enemy and form a united front, for the betterment, and indeed now the very survival, of mankind. Thank you for your attention. Any questions?